The Duchess of Malfi

“Ferdinand: May be some oblique character in your face

made him suspect you.”

Bosola: “Doth he study physiognomy?

There’s no more credit to be given to the face

then to a sick man’s urine, which some call

the physician’s whore because she cozens him.

He did suspect me wrongfully.”

Ferdinand invokes physiognomy, a debunked racist pseudoscience that claims you can tell something about a person’s characteristics or abilities based on their facial features. Ferdinand uses this as a reason why the Cardinal does not trust Bosola. However, Bosola debunks physiognomy as pseudoscience. He compares it to the science of reading urine: in the medieval and early modern periods, physicians would “read” someone’s urine to diagnose them. In Bosola’s opinion, neither of these practices are sound scientific tools.

“Ferdinand: Fare ye well—

and women like that part which, like the lamprey,

hath ne’er a bone in ‘t.

The Duchess: Fie, sir!

Ferdinand: Nay,

I mean the tongue: variety of courtship.

What cannot a neat nave with a smooth tale

make a woman believe? Farewell, lusty widow.” 

Ferdinand uses sexually-charged innuendo to tease the Duchess. She assumes that “that part” is a reference to a phallus. Ferdinand’s corrective is no less sexual. He says that he was referencing a tongue, but then mentions the “variety of courtship” a tongue can enact, denoting both wooing and sexual activity. Ferdinand’s sexualized language reflects both his misogyny and his deep desire to control the sexuality of the “lusty widow.”

“Duchess: One of your eyes is bloodshot—use my ring to ‘t.

They say ‘tis very sovereign—’twas my wedding ring,

and I did vow never to part with it

but to my second husband.

Antonio: You have parted with it now.

Duchess: Yes, to help your eyesight.

Antonio: You have made me start blind.

Duchess: How?

Antonio: There is a saucy and ambitious devil

is dancing in this circle.

Duchess: Remove him.

Antonio: How?

Duchess: There needs a small conjuration, when your finger may do it: thus.— is it fit?

[she puts her ring upon his finger;] he kneels.”

In this romantic scene, the Duchess proposes marriage to Antonio. In doing so, she is Transcending Societal Boundaries in terms of both gender and class. In giving Antonio her ring, she takes the traditionally masculine role of courting and proposing marriage. Since Antonio is of a lower social class, the Duchess is also defying social conventions by marrying someone “beneath her station.” The Duchess’s ring also functions as an important symbol throughout the play (See: Symbols & Motifs).

“Cariola: Whether the spirit of greatness or of woman

Reign most in her, I know not, but it shows

A fearful madness. I owe her much of pity.” 

Cariola juxtaposes the spirit of “greatness” with the spirit of “woman.” This is indicative of a larger societal belief that women are lesser rulers than men and more prone to be driven by emotion—therefore “greatness” and “woman” are presented as antithetical. Though the Duchess embraces her femininity, she also has masculine aspects. She often refers to herself as a prince, and as Cariola says here, she is moved by the spirit of greatness. Cariola also worries, however, that the Duchess’s feelings are a “fearful madness” that will lead to her ruin.

“Bosola: Why, from your scurvy face-physic. To behold thee not painted inclines somewhat near a miracle: these, in they face here, were deep ruts and foul sloughs the last progress. There was a lady in France that, having had the smallpox, flayed the skin off her face to make it more level; and, whereas before she looked like nutmeg-grater, after she resembled an abortive hedgehog.”

Bosola uses the rhetoric of The Link Between Inner and Outer Maladies to attack the Old Lady for wearing cosmetics. His misogynistic accusation is fueled by the belief that women alter their outsides to disguise their true inner natures. Bosola’s preoccupation with the supposed deceit of wearing makeup also ties into the play’s thematic preoccupations with corruption and deceit.

“Old Lady: I will hear no more of the glass-house—you are still abusing women!”

When Bosola verbally attacks the Old Lady a second time, she defends herself and other women from him. This is one of several places where the play is uniquely anti-misogynistic compared to other early modern dramas. The play gives a female character license to speak up for herself—however, it is worth noting that no actual women were allowed on Elizabethan or Jacobean stages, and teenage boys would play female characters.

“Antonio: [aside] The great are like the base—nay, they are the same—

When they seek shameful ways to avoid shame.”

Antonio transcends societal expectations of class by deconstructing the supposed greatness of the higher classes. He notes that they are equally susceptible to shameful acts and feelings and are not morally superior just by virtue of their birth. He also accuses them of resorting to “shameful ways” to maintain their social prestige and power—a nod to the play’s theme of Corruption, Deceit, and Betrayal.

“Cardinal: You may thank me, lady,

I have taken you off your melancholy perch,

Bore you upon my fist, and showed you game,

And let you fly at it.—I pray thee, kiss me.—

When thou wast with they husband, thou was watched

Like a tame elephant.—Still you are to thank me.—

Thou hadst only kisses from him, and high feeding,

But what delight was that?”

The Cardinal uses animal metaphors to describe his mistress, Julia. He calls her previous marriage a “melancholy perch,” comparing her to a trapped bird, and says that, by comparison, he bears her on his fist and allows her to “fly.” The Cardinal positions himself as Julia’s keeper: he “let” her fly, implying that she is subservient to his wishes. The use of hawking imagery embodies the Cardinal’s self-perception of being in control of Julia even when ostensibly allowing her freedom. He demands repeatedly that she kiss and thank him, reinforcing the power dynamic between them.

“Cardinal: Shall our blood,

The royal blood of Aragon and Castile,

Be thus attainted?

Ferdinand: Apply desperate physic.

We must not now use balsamum, but fire,

The smarting cupping glass, for that’s the mean

To purge infected blood, such blood as hers.

There is a kind of pity in mine eye;

I’ll give it to my handkercher; and, now ‘tis here,

I’ll bequeath this to her bastard.”

The Cardinal scolds Ferdinand for letting his choleric nature send him into a rage when they get news of the Duchess’s secret family. However, the Cardinal also expresses anger, believing that her marriage to someone of a lower class taints their entire blood line. Ferdinand interprets the tainting of blood in a more bodily way: he thinks the Duchess’s literal blood is infected, making her lose control of her passions. In this sense, both men are united by a desire to control the Duchess, albeit from slightly different angles: the Cardinal wishes to preserve the purity of her blood, while Ferdinand wishes to control her sexuality.

“Bosola: What do you intend to do?

Ferdinand: Can you guess?

Bosola: No.

Ferdinand: Do not ask, then:

He that can compass me, and know my drifts,

May say he hath put a girdle ‘bout the world

And sounded all her quicksands.

Bosola: I do not

think so.

Ferdinand: What do you think then, pray?

Bosola: That you

are your own chronicle too much, and grossly

flatter yourself.”

This exchange between Bosola and Ferdinand characterizes the increasing tension and hostility between them, as well as Bosola’s shifting allegiances. Ferdinand thinks of himself as a mastermind and Bosola as an underling. Ferdinand says that any man who can “compass” him, or understand the scope of his schemes, would need to be able to compass “the world.” Bosola, however, thinks that Ferdinand is telling inflated stories about himself that are not representative of his true abilities. Just as many characters in the play seek to deceive others for their own gain, so too does Ferdinand experience a degree of self-deception as well.

“Duchess: For know, whether I am doomed to live or die, / I can do both like a prince.”

The Duchess echoes some of the most famous words of the late Queen Elizabeth I, who claimed in her famous “Speech to the Troops at Tilbury” that while she had “the body of a weak and feeble woman” she had the “heart and stomach of a king” (Queen Elizabeth I. Speech to the Troops at Tilbury. August 19, 1588). The Duchess often refers to herself as a prince and openly defies the stereotypes men around her have about women. In dying defiantly and without fear, the Duchess defies gendered expectations about women, revealing a courage traditionally associated with men.

“Duchess: Why might not I marry? / I have not gone about it, in this, to create / Any new world, or custom.”

The Duchess’s reasons for transcending the social boundaries of her gender and class by marrying Antonio are very human. She tells Ferdinand that she did not do it to make a point or establish a new custom—or, by doing this, to make him angry. She did so because she loved Antonio. The Duchess perhaps does not understand—or wishes not to accept—that, to men like Ferdinand who structure their lives by the logic of violent patriarchy and strict social hierarchies, doing this is the same as creating new worlds and customs.

“First Pilgrim: Here’s a strange turn of state! Who would have thought

So great a lady would have matched herself

Unto so mean a person? Yet the Cardinal

Bears himself much too cruel.

Second Pilgrim: They are banished.

[…]

First Pilgrim: But by what justice?

Second Pilgrim: Sure, I think by none,

Only her brother’s instigation.”

This commentary by the pilgrims is the only time in the play that the voices of those outside the Malfi, Roman, and Milani courts are heard. Two pilgrims comment on the spectacle made by the Cardinal as he banishes the Duchess. As witnesses to the pantomime, these pilgrims serve as stand-ins for the theatre audience. Their commentary regarding how the Cardinal is “much too cruel” and that he operates by no justice, only his own “instigation,” speaks to the play’s preoccupations about how the corrupt wielding of power undermines stability and justice for all.

“Bosola: Come, you must live.

Duchess: That’s the greatest torture souls feel in hell—

In hell, that they must live, and cannot die.

Portia, I’ll new-kindle they coals again,

And revive the rare and almost dead example

Of a loving wife.

Bosola: O, fie! Despair? Remember

You are a Christian.

Duchess: The church enjoins fasting:

I’ll starve myself to death.”

The Duchess alludes to Portia, wife of Julius Cesar’s assassin Brutus. Portia reportedly died by suicide after holding hot coals in her mouth due to the pain of being separated from Brutus. The Duchess takes this as an example of “a loving wife” and seeks to emulate her. Bosola reminds her that, unlike Portia, who was a Roman pagan, the Duchess is a Christian, and her religion condemns dying by suicide. The Duchess then uses the rhetoric of the Church, which urges people to fast, to thwart Bosola’s rebuttal. This exchange is another instance in which the Duchess defies social and gender expectations by steadfastly asserting her own agency.

“Bosola: Faith, end here,

And go no further in your cruelty.

Send her a penitential garment to put on

Next to her delicate skin, and furnish her

With beads and prayerbooks.

Ferdinand: Damn her! That body of hers,

While that my blood ran pure in ‘t, was more worth

Than that which thou wouldst comfort, called a soul.”

Bosola has grown upset with Ferdinand, who he believes has tormented the Duchess too much. He asks her to send the Duchess to a nunnery—a punishment often meted out to women perceived as troublesome, such as in Hamlet when Hamlet orders Ophelia to a nunnery. Ferdinand misunderstands Bosola, fixating on the worth of the Duchess’s physical body rather than her soul. Ferdinand’s continuing fixation on the Duchess’s physicality once again speaks to his sexual obsessions and desire for total control over her “blood” and passions.

“Here, by a Madman, this song is sung, to a dismal kind of music.

O, let us howl some heady note,

Some deadly dogged howl,

Sounding as from the threat’ning throat

Of beasts and fatal fowl!

As ravens, screech-owls, bulls, and bears,

We’ll bill and bawl our parts,

Till irksome noise have cloyed your ears

And corrosive your hearts.

At last whenas our choir wants breath,

Our bodies being blest,

We’ll sing like swans, to welcome death,

And die in love and rest.”

This song is sung by a person with intellectual disabilities, whom the text pejoratively calls “a Madman.” Throughout the play, characters who are perceived to deviate in some way from an accepted norm or status quo are dehumanized further with animalizing rhetoric. For instance, this person calls their song a “howl,” a verb usually associated with dogs, and uses many other animal metaphors to characterize their actions. The closing lines about “welcom[ing] death” foreshadow the death the Duchess will soon face with calmness and acceptance, with her desire to be reunited in peace with her loved ones.

“Duchess: Am I not thy Duchess?

Bosola: You art some great woman, sure, for riot begins to sit on thy merry forehead, clad in grey hairs, twenty years sooner than on a merry milkmaid’s. Thou sleepest worse than if a mouse should be forced to take up her lodging in a cat’s ear; a little infant that breeds its teeth, should it lie with thee, would cry out as if thou wert the more unquiet bedfellow.

Duchess: I am the Duchess of Malfi still.”

Bosola prescriptively tries to claim that the Duchess’s quality of life is worse than that of other women because of the choices she has made and the life she has chosen to lead. His comparison of her prematurely-aged appearance to that of a “merry milkmaid” also hints at the way she has lowered herself socially through her secret marriage to a man of lower rank. The Duchess reclaims her definition of self by setting the terms of her own identity and asserting her own power, reminding Bosola that she is “the Duchess of Malfi still.” The Duchess’s dignity and self-possession contrast with the violence and chaos that is going on around her.

Duchess: I know death hath ten thousand several doors

For men to take their exits; and ‘tis found

They go on such strange geometrical hinges,

You may open them both ways—Any way, for heaven sake,

So I were out of your whispering. Tell my brothers

That I perceive death, now I am well awake,

Best gift is they can give, or I can take.”

The Duchess explains why she is not afraid of death. Death has “geometrical hinges” such that men can “open them both ways”: you are killed, or you kill. The Duchess, who will not do the latter, does the former. She meets death with dignity and without fear and maintains her autonomy to the last, even insisting that death is the “best gift” her brothers can give her, as she wishes to be reunited with her loved ones in death. In this way, she is a distinctly strong female character among other early modern dramas.

“Bosola: Fix your eye here.

Ferdinand: Constantly.

Bosola: Do you not weep?

Other sins only speak; murder shrieks out;

The element of water moistens the earth,

But blood flies upwards and bedews the heavens.

Ferdinand: Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle; she died young.

Bosola: I think not so; her infelicity

Seemed to have years too many.”

Bosola commands Ferdinand to look at the Duchess’s corpse and wonders why he does not weep for his crimes. Ferdinand, whose words often indicate a sexual preoccupation with his sister, is dazzled by the sight of her corpse and her youth: “Mine eyes dazzle; she died young.” Bosola counters Ferdinand’s idealization of the corpse by reminding him that the Duchess died prematurely aged: “her infelicity / Seemed to have years too many.” While Bosola has grown disgusted with the murder, Ferdinand still appears to be in a state of confusion and denial.

“Pescara: It was Antonio’s land: not forfeited

By course of law, but ravished from his throat

By the Cardinal’s entreaty. It were not fit

I should bestow so main a piece of wrong

Upon my friend; ‘tis a gratification

Only due to a strumpet, for it is injustice.”

This is one of a handful of moments in the play where the audience is privy to how the external world of nobles perceives the tension between Antonio, the Duchess, and her brothers. Pescara is sympathetic with Antonio but does not have the power to intervene in the situation. This drives home how power imbalances even between nobles can make it difficult to reform court corruption at the highest levels: The Cardinal has acted not by “course of law” but through his own unjust “entreaty,” thereby speaking to the “injustice” of the Cardinal’s behavior and the kind of corrupted rule he represents.

“Doctor: One met the Duke, ‘bout midnight in a lane

Behind Saint Mark’s Church, with the leg of a man

Upon his shoulder; and he howled fearfully;

Said he was a wolf, only the difference

Was, a wolf’s skin was hairy on the outside,

His on the inside.”

The doctor details the circumstances that led him to diagnose Ferdinand with lycanthropy. In the early modern period, lycanthropy was an active diagnosis that people received. It was typically seen as a matter of mental health rather than a transformation of someone’s physical body. Ferdinand’s lycanthropy is used as narrative prosthesis for his cruel personality: His claim that his wolf’s hair is “on the inside” speaks to his guilty conscience over the Duchess’s murder, while his belief that he is now a wolf is an ironic inversion of the dehumanizing rhetoric he once used about the Duchess’s children. This passage ties into the theme The Link Between Inner and Outer Maladies.

“Delio: I would not have you go to th’ Cardinal’s tonight.

Do not.

Echo: Do not.

Delio: Wisdom doth more moderate wasting sorrow

Than time: take time for ‘t; be mindful of they safety.

Echo: Be mindful of thy safety.

Antonio: Necessity compels me:

Make scrutiny throughout the passes

Of your own life, you’ll find it impossible

To fly your fate.

Echo: O, fly your fate!”

The echo of the Duchess’s voice from her grave bounces back Delio and Antonio’s voices as they walk past it unknowingly, while on their way to the Cardinal’s chambers. At first, the echo echoes back particularly meaningful parts of speech in ways that seem as if the Duchess is contributing to their conversation from beyond the grave. This effect grows more acute when the echo alters Antonio’s words into a clear warning: “O, fly your fate!” This brings the play into a distinctly supernatural realm, while also continuing to give the Duchess a degree of power and agency even in death.

“Malateste: How came Antonio by his death?

Bosola: In a mist; I know not how—

Such a mistake as I have often seen

In a play. O, I am gone!

We are only like dead walls, or vaulted graves,

That, ruined, yields no echo. Fare you well.

It may be pain, but no harm to me to die

In so good a quarrel.”

This passage contains some of Bosola’s last words. He draws attention to the meta-theatrical aspects of tragedy: “Such a mistake as I have often seen / In a play.” His accidental killing of Antonio was narratively necessary for catharsis to be reached at the play’s end. He also recognizes his death as necessary: the “so good a quarrel” that kills him also allows him to take revenge for the Duchess, Antonio, Julia, and himself. Bosola’s change of heart at the play’s end grants him a degree of redemption denied to both the Cardinal and Ferdinand, who die tormented by what they have done.